A New Plymouth-based seamstress hopes to reduce textile waste by teaching others practical skills that give their worn-out clothes a second life.
Seamstress Sam Jay has been a costume maker, a tailor for the British police, a bridal seamstress, taxidermist, wardrobe assistant, and even a set maker for the band Iron Maiden.
Now she has added to her impressive résumé — by launching a group called the Stitch Up Society that teaches people the skills required to alter and repair their own clothes.
“There’s so much textile waste at the moment and I wanted to do something to kind of change that.”
She said the skills are “quite easy to pick up” and that the basic sewing skills have been lost as society — literally — has grown further apart.
“Nowadays — I’m obviously from the UK so my family lives quite a long way away. I don’t have aunties, and uncles or a nanna on my doorstep that I can take my clothes to and say ‘can you teach me?’,” she said.
“I think it is something that is being lost, which is another reason behind Stitch Up Society because we don’t have the same family connections as we used to. It’s a place where you can go and share skills and knowledge.”
She said she had always grown up in a house where her practical mum stitched her own clothes and made toys for her as a child.
“I was always quite good at it at school I guess, because I’d had people around me who were good at it.”
“It kind of spiralled from there and I’ve really enjoyed it.”
Stitch Up Society can be found on Facebook and Instagram.